Many modern projects to create multimedia content, such as video and audio, are developed with the aim of maximizing their use and commercial exploitation. Such maximization can occur across several dimensions, including geographical territory, audience type, the venue in which the content is consumed, the delivery platform, the means of distribution, and the media format. To achieve such audience penetration, a major theatrical composition may be distributed in over 80 release formats. For example, many movies and television programs are made into versions suitable for distribution in different countries, which generally involve creating different language versions for video (titles, subtitles) and audio (dialog). Targeted audience types include adults, and children in various age brackets, with corresponding versions having different selections of content. The location at which the content is consumed places content constraints on programs, such as suitability for various age groups in a public theater, or the avoidance of aviation accidents for in-flight movies. A host of technical requirements also spawn additional versions for delivery, including versions for different means of distribution, such as DVD and the Internet, versions for different viewing platforms, such as theatres, television, computers, and mobile devices, versions that must adhere to specific video and audio standards requirements such as NTSC and PAL, and versions for 2D or stereo 3D video viewing.
In generally practiced workflows, editors create a master program, which is then disseminated to others charged with creating the related versions required for delivery across the various dimensions referred to above. Such groups may further edit the program to customize the master, improve aspects of the master, or correct problems they identified during customization. Even though these changes are made in the context of creating a specific program version, they may apply to some or all of the other versions of the master that are being generated. Current workflows provide little or no support for enabling such changes to be passed on to other versions. Furthermore, even once the master has been forwarded to the other groups, additional changes may be made to the master, in which case some of the work already performed at the version level may be wasted, and the customization started again from scratch. In addition, after completion of a first set of deliverable programs derived from a master program, unanticipated new versions may be added to the requirements. Current editorial workflows provide little or no means of leveraging work that has already gone into producing the existing programs that may be applicable to the newly required deliverables. Instead, an editor is typically required to start fresh from the master to create the new deliverables.
In sum, current media editorial workflows for creating multi-version, multiple format compositions are woefully inefficient in creating the downstream versions based on one or more masters, permitting changes to the master(s) with subsequent changes in the downstream versions, and automating the creation of many versions.